Background

For 10 years, Pedigree has been committed to helping pet shelters with their “Agir pour l’adoption” programme. In addition to their Feeding Project, the brand uses its position as an advertiser to support adoption. In France alone, nearly 100 000 pets are abandoned every year. Pedigree wanted to give shelter dogs the best possible chance of finally finding a family by exclusively addressing those who could potentially adopt them.

Describe the creative idea

On Instagram, dogs have become more than just pets. Some have become actual stars, with their own accounts and thousands of fans who follow them religiously. This is unfortunately not the case for shelter dogs…So we came up with an unprecedented operation: Dogs for Dogs. Where the Instagram dogs lend their accounts to dogs waiting to be adopted.

Describe the strategy

French people spend an average of 92 hours a year on Instagram. That’s nearly 15 minutes a day liking all sorts of influencers. Among them, dog profiles, which do nothing but share their everyday lives as dogs. And which have the attention of tens of thousands of people potentially sympathetic to the cause of adoption. But if so many people can love a dog, why couldn’t they love a dog of the same breed, but who’s been abandoned? This is how Dogs for Dogs was born. An operation designed purely for social media, inviting the dogs most followed on Instagram to lend their accounts, and consequently their fame, to dogs who need it much more. Dogs, whose profiles could be consulted on agirpourladoption.fr via a simple link in the Instagram influencer’s bio or story.

Describe the execution

The operation took place in March 2018. Over the period of a day, the most influential French dogs on Instagram lent their accounts to dogs of the same breed awaiting adoption. Among them, @bibi_charly (35,5 k), @blogofbruce (29 k) or @lewisfunnydog_westie (38,5 k) from the MyPetAgency. Their followers then liked their profiles and their content like they did every day. Before finding out that, this time, they were shelter dogs. Dogs whose profiles they could consult via a simple link, generating dozens and dozens of adoption requests.

List the results

In the end, the operation was extended to shelters all over France. Traffic to agirpouladoption.fr increased by 62% and 70% of the dogs were adopted. All with no media spending. But above all, for the first time, dogs were supporting the cause of other dogs and doing so thanks to Instagram.